


every version of yourself

by LittleLostStar



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: 5+1 Things, Childhood Sweethearts, F/M, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Idiots in Love, Prom Night, Rey Needs A Hug, Single POV, Smut at the very end, Tags to be added, based on "mirrorball" from folklore, disastrous first kisses, reylo/folklore drabble collab, terrible communication skills
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-02
Updated: 2020-08-20
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:08:45
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,792
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25661890
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleLostStar/pseuds/LittleLostStar
Summary: Five times Rey and Ben almost get it right, and the one time they finally nail it.~TWO: The first time Ben kisses Rey, he almost gets it right.They're fourteen and sitting in one of the band practice rooms, side by side at the piano, their breaths thick in the stuffy windowless space. Ben has been playing piano since he was five years old, and is an exceptional musician; Rey has been playing for about five months, and is officially hopeless at it, but she has developed an equally hopeless addiction to watching Ben when he plays the piano Rey really has been trying, but everything that isn’t directly Ben-related goes in one ear and out the other. Her chronic inattentiveness is a symptom of a larger disease that has transformed Rey into a sweaty, stammering, anxious mess, suddenly unable to be in the presence of her best friend without getting lost in the depths of his dark brown eyes or lulled to incoherence by the brand new bass tone of his voice, which causes every offhand comment come out in a growl that makes her toes literally curl.Crush doesn’t even begin to describe what she’s going through; it’s more like Rey’s gone completely insane.
Relationships: Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 37
Kudos: 64
Collections: Reylo/Folklore Drabble Collection





	1. (and when i break, it’s in a million pieces)

**Author's Note:**

> Hi there! This is my first published reylo fic, based on ["mirrorball"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KaM1bCuG4xo), because holy crap Taylor could not have dropped folklore at a better moment for this unrepentant songfic addict. This was supposed to be nice and quick; now it is six chapters. I plan to update fairly quickly over the course of this week, so stay tuned! I hope you enjoy!!

The first time Rey meets Ben, she almost gets it right. 

She is ten years old, pulling at the sleeves of a school uniform that feels starchy and suffocating. She is still reeling, shell-shocked and stunned; for in the space of a few weeks, her entire world has changed. After years of hardscrabble life on her own, she suddenly has a new home, new clothes, new classmates—everything has improved except for Rey herself, and the gulf between her shiny outer life and the storm of turmoil boiling under her skin makes her want to scream or throw up, often in equal measure. 

_The past is behind you,_ her grandfather keeps telling her. _There’s no need to bother with any of that nonsense anymore._

So she tries; it’s the one thing she knows she can do, no matter what. Rey doesn’t have very much, but she’s been _trying_ for as long as she can remember; as a result, she has spent every waking minute trying to acquiesce, to be good, to fit in. Trying to feel better. 

It isn’t working very well. 

The orphanage was undeniably a horrible place, filthy and ragged and brutal and mean, but there was an honesty to it. Rey had to fight to survive, but at least she could fight in the open. Her grandfather’s mansion, by contrast, is like the highest security areas of the medical ward: stuffy, silent, ominously still. Everything has a rightful place, a proper orientation, a purpose and reason—and Rey has been loosed into this cramped china shop, a shuffling and nervous bull, and told to just _feel better_ , as if it’s a switch she can flip. School is even worse, with its uniforms and rules and constant homework that Rey somehow always manages to forget; school is like a demented inverse version of the orphanage, where everything is gorgeous and grand and yet everyone seems to hate her all the same. Rey’s no longer getting in fights or hiding from orderlies, no longer hungry or dirty or wanting; she has been rescued, pulled out from the darkness and into the light. She should be happy. She should be okay. 

But instead she’s angry. 

At first Rey was overwhelmed, her complete dissociation easily misconstrued as breathless awe by the adults around her. But now that the anger has appeared, it’s all-consuming; it roars to life as soon as she opens her eyes in the morning and pushes her forward every step of the day, narrowing her vision to a tunnel tinged red around the edges. She feels like everyone is always looking at her, whispering behind their hands, spreading the word about the freak from the orphanage, but never saying a single word to her face; it’s like Rey is trapped on mute, an animal being gawked at by tourists behind glass. 

And to top it all off, she’s lost again, despite the fact that she’s been at the school for a month already. The Wilhuff Tarkin Academy is in an old building with lots of dead ends and bewildering hallways, and she’s walked past A141 and A143 dozens of times—yet A142 seems not to exist. She turns down another hallway, dim and cramped, dodging past students rummaging through their lockers and gossiping in front of doors. Rey has just spotted room A142 when her foot hits something fleshy and unyielding; she goes sprawling across the floor, the wind knocked out of her lungs as the heavy backpack lands on top of her. The hall immediately falls silent as dozens of eyes turn to see who just ate shit in front of everyone, and laughter is already rippling through the crowd when she raises her head. Tears spring hot to Rey’s eyes and the world transforms into an ugly blur as she turns to see what she tripped over. 

It’s a boy—one of her new classmates, she thinks, but she can barely make out his features through the haze of humiliation. He has dark hair and a too-large nose, and his legs are sticking straight out into the hall; there’s some soft yellow paper spread on a hardcover book across his lap, with a little pot of ink balanced on the corner. The boy looks up at her, his pen frozen in his hand.

“What did you do that for?!” Rey snaps, her voice thick with tears as the giggles keep rippling all around them. 

“What did _I_ do? You ran into _me_ ,” he replies cooly. 

Behind her, Rey can hear the whispers, skittering from left to right like cockroaches in her periphery: _Orphan. Charity case. Headcase. What a weirdo._ She clenches her hands into fists. 

“You shouldn’t have your legs sticking out into the hallway like that! Who raised you?” she retorts, folding her arms across her chest. The assembled onlookers burst out into a new round of giggles, as if Rey’s made a joke, but she doesn’t understand what’s funny about any of this. 

The boy has gone back to writing, apparently oblivious to the jeers and murmurs as he dips his pen into the pot of ink and scratches letters out onto the paper. “I was raised by my parents,” he answers without looking up. “So who raised _you_?” 

Later, Rey will search her memory in vain to try and recall the logic that convinced her to do what she does next. In retrospect, she will identify this moment for what it really was: a cry for help, a whisper in the dark, a desperate plea for a friend. But in the heat of it, with her frustration rising and the snickering of her classmates poking at her from what feels like every direction, she short-circuits instead, and the fury blooms and races through her veins like fire. She storms over to the boy’s side and flicks her foot, upending the book and sending the little glass pot flying; it hits the boy square on the face and rolls all the way down his shirt and across his lap, spilling dark blue ink the whole time until it tumbles off his leg and hits the floor with a _clink_. 

There’s a moment of stillness, when Rey’s entire world narrows to a few pinpoints: the steady drip of ink onto the floor, the sound of laughter exploding all around them, the fluorescent lights reflecting in the boy’s shining eyes. He wipes his mouth, smearing dark blue ink across his pale cheek. 

“Solo! You look like you blew one of the Smurfs!” comes a call from one of the boys in the crowd, and in an instant Rey suddenly feels cold and sick inside. 

“Aw, the two freaks found each other!” a girl sneers. 

The door to A142 slams open and their math teacher, Brendol Hux, comes storming out. He takes one look at the scene and turns an impressive shade of crimson. 

“What did you do?” he snaps at Rey, who recoils as if physically struck. 

“I…”

“Principal’s office! Now!” Mr. Hux snaps, pointing with his thick stubby finger. “Solo! Get yourself cleaned up. I’m sure your parents will want to hear about this—”

The bell rings with a _clang_ overhead, sending the assembled students scrambling to their classrooms; the boy picks up his bag and walks away, his dark blue mouth pulled into a solemn frown, and the taste of metal seeps into Rey’s mouth. Mr. Hux fixes her with a look that suggests she’s not so much a ten-year-old girl as she is a piece of already-chewed gum stuck to his dress shoe, then turns on his heel and disappears back into his classroom, slamming the door and leaving her alone. 

Rey does not go to the principal’s office; instead she walks in the opposite direction, across the entire school campus to the very oldest and draftiest parts of the building, where she knocks on the door in the furthest nook of the heritage wing overlooking the gardens. 

“Come in!” 

The door swings open to reveal the school counselor, Maz, sitting in her usual overstuffed wingback armchair. 

“Ah, Rey! Come in. I had a feeling you’d be showing up,” Maz grins, her eyes twinkling mischievously behind her thick eyeglasses. “Just had a very interesting phone call with the principal, who has been expecting you for at least ten minutes.” 

Rey sinks onto the couch by the window, shucking off her shoes and pulling her knees to her chest. “He would have just sent me here anyway,” she mumbles. “Why go all the way to the administrative wing?” 

“Smart girl. Never put yourself in the path of an angry white man unless your life depends on it.” Maz squints at the post-it note in her hand. “It seems you picked a fight with...Ben Solo? Wow, kiddo, you sure do know how to make an impression.” 

Rey wraps her arms even tighter around her legs, as if the pressure could calm her pounding heart. “He tripped me,” she mumbles. 

“Did he really?” Maz’s voice is perfectly pitched, a combination of curiosity and empathy that’s honey-sweet and comforting. 

“It was an accident. I know he didn’t mean it,” Rey whispers, the shame slamming into her like a tidal wave. She buries her face in her knees, her tears staining hot on her scratchy black tights, and whispers into the fabric. “I don’t know why I did it. I was just angry.”

She hears Maz’s pen tapping gently against the rim of her eyeglasses. “Anger feels like a force unto itself sometimes, doesn’t it?” she says. 

“I should be able to control it!” Rey suddenly blurts, her head snapping back up. “I don’t know why I can’t do this!” 

Maz’s thick glasses magnify every twitch and squint of her eyes, making all of her reactions seem outsized and exaggerated. “Have you told anyone else that you’ve felt this anger?” 

“No,” Rey retorts miserably, as a dozen invisible levees break and emotions begin to flood through her. “I don’t have a right to be angry. And even if I did, it’s not like I have anyone to tell; they all treat me like a freak.” The confession slips out of her suddenly, and the rest comes tumbling out of her mouth like vomit: “He’s a freak too, that boy, Ben—none of the kids stood up for him, they all laughed. I…” she swallows. “I always tried to stick up for the littler kids, in the—before, back when—at my old, um, school. And now I’m just—” a sob shakes itself out of her. “My grandfather rescued me and got me into this school and it’s all been so awful, I don’t understand, I just...I don’t think I’m meant to be here.” 

She claps a hand to her mouth, swallowing a wave of emotion as her shoulders tremble with sobs. For a few excruciating minutes Rey can barely breathe, shaking so hard that her whole back spasms, as weeks of fear and anxiety finally flame to life and burn themselves out. It feels like a very long time until she can breathe without shuddering. 

“You know,” Maz says softly, “I shouldn’t tell you this, but: I talk to Ben Solo twice a week, and he says the exact same thing.” 

Rey’s head snaps up, her brow furrowed. “What? What do you mean?” 

Maz shrugs. “It sounds as if you’re suffering from a great deal of loneliness, and that will poison even the hardiest soul. We are not meant to walk through this world alone, no matter how hard the world tries to convince us otherwise.” She lowers her glasses, her eyes adorably tiny without them, and winks. “I think you could use a friend, kiddo.” 

Rey huffs. “Well, I’m not going to find one in Ben Solo,” she mutters darkly. “He’ll never speak to me again, after what I did.” 

“Did he tell you that?” 

“What? No, of course not. I just assumed, because of the whole, you know,” Rey gestures up and down her front, “the ink thing.” 

Maz taps her pen against the rim of her glasses again. “Yes, well, that certainly is an obstacle, but not an insurmountable one,” she nods. “If you were in his position, what do you think you could do to make it right?” 

Rey’s face burns hot with shame. “Nothing,” she whispers. “Leave him alone forever. Change schools.” 

This garners a soft chuckle. “Well, how about we think a little smaller than that? Perhaps an apology, just as a start.”

“He won’t believe me.” 

“What if you didn’t just say the words? What if you did something that indicates that you understand what you did wrong, and demonstrates that you want to make it right?”

Rey thinks of Ben with dark blue ink like insect blood smeared across his face, and she rests her chin on her knees. 

_Something to make it right._

It takes her three weeks to save up, working as many odd jobs as she can for whichever of her grandfather’s staff will throw her a few bucks. The next time she comes into math class, she takes a seat right behind Ben Solo, at the very back of the class. His eyes widen imperceptibly as she approaches, and Rey swallows another burst of darkness, clutching the box she’s bought in one hand. She waits ten minutes, until Mr. Hux’s back is turned to the blackboard, and then tentatively reaches forward and taps Ben on the shoulder. He flinches, curling away from her, and Rey chokes back the surge of anxiety that wells in her throat. 

“I’m sorry,” she whispers, setting the box onto his desk. For a few seconds Ben regards it as if it’s a bomb, and then he reaches over—his fingers are long, almost willowy, she realizes—and opens the box with a delicate touch. Rey clenches her hands under her desk, watching as he pulls out the pot of ink, the glass gleaming under the fluorescents overhead. 

“Oh,” he whispers, his fingers tracing the label, “ _Windsor & Newton_. I…” 

“—Ben Solo! What do you have there?” Mr. Hux calls. 

In an instant, the pot has disappeared, like a magician’s sleight of hand. “Nothing, sir,” Ben replies, polite and resigned. “Just helping Rey with one of the questions.” 

Mr. Hux scowls. “Well, Miss Palpatine—”

“Johnson,” she mutters under her breath, and that’s when Ben looks back at her, just for a moment, just long enough to make Rey’s heart skip a beat. 

Hux’s scowl deepens. “As I was saying, if Miss _Palpatine_ wishes to understand the problems, perhaps she would be better off paying sufficient attention to the lecture, wouldn’t you agree?” 

“Yes, sir,” Ben replies. 

As Mr. Hux turns back to the board, Rey stares down at her problem sheet, trying to focus on his droning voice. She nearly jumps out of her skin when the note lands on her desk; she looks up, but Ben is hunched over his worksheet, scribbling away. When she unfolds the torn piece of paper, she finds the letters neat and careful, like the gold-embossed placards her grandfather sometimes uses for his very best dinner parties. Even written in pencil, it looks incredibly fancy, more fancy than she’s ever deserved before: 

_Rey Johnson_. 

She feels her cheeks get hot, and she scribbles her reply before she loses her nerve, dropping the folded paper by his elbow while Mr. Hux drones about trigonometry. 

**BEN SOLO. SEE, I KNOW YOUR NAME TOO.**

The next note arrives just as Rey’s pulse begins to flutter with anticipation. 

_Thank you for the ink. Also, the answer to question six is supposed to be 2, not 4.7._

There’s a burst of something hot in her veins, but it isn’t anger this time. Rey almost breaks her pencil writing out her reply. 

**SOMEONE FORGOT TO CARRY THE 5, THEN.**

She pauses, then adds another line: 

**DID THE INK WASH OUT?**

Rey waits for the right moment before dropping the note, and she watches it disappear under his sleeve and into his lap without a single missed beat. This time she keeps her eyes trained on him, and actually catches the moment when his hand swoops back and effortlessly flicks his reply onto her desk. 

_No. I’ve had my entire face replaced. Can’t you tell?_

A giggle escapes her before she can stop it, and it feels like the whole class stops to turn and look at her—everyone except Ben, who continues studiously taking notes. His utterly calm demeanor seems to radiate backwards to coax her shoulders to relax and her breath to stay slow. Rey exhales softly and sits up straight, making a show of returning to her own worksheet even as her eyes fixate on the back of Ben’s neck as if it’s an anchor point in a storm. 

Eventually the class loses interest and turns away, and Rey surreptitiously tears off a strip of paper from the bottom of her worksheet, scrawling her message and slipping it to Ben’s elbow before she can chicken out. 

**WANT TO BE FRIENDS?**

Her heart is still hammering when the next note arrives—tossed expertly over his shoulder without a single look back, hitting the middle of her notepad with a little _smack_ sound. She opens it slowly, fingers trembling as she sees the one-word reply: 

_Yes._


	2. (you'll find me on my tallest tiptoes, spinning)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Crush_ doesn’t even begin to describe what she’s going through; it’s more like Rey’s gone completely insane. She’s cried herself to sleep more times than she can count, has lost whole hours to counting the freckles scattered across his nose. She can’t eat without thinking of his lips, can’t do her homework without his voice in her head correcting her mistakes, can barely take notes in class without her eyes wandering to the back of his head and his glorious dark hair. 
> 
> Also, last week Ben put his arm around her and covered each of her hands with his own when he demonstrated a technique, and she hasn’t stopped thinking about it since.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello friends! Apologies for the delay in updating, but I've been consumed by *checks notes* every possible Reylo AU at once! But I'm really really happy to bring you this chapter of teenage disaster crushes; I hope you enjoy!

The first time Ben kisses Rey, he almost gets it right.

They're fourteen and sitting in one of the band practice rooms, side by side at the piano, their breaths thick in the stuffy windowless space. Ben has been playing piano since he was five years old, and is an exceptional musician; Rey has been playing for about five months, and is officially hopeless at it, but she has developed an equally hopeless addiction to watching Ben when _he_ plays the piano, and she definitely hasn’t complained about his offer to tutor her during band class. So for the past five months they’ve sat like this, for an entire hour each school day, as Ben patiently explains how to read the music and use the pedals and everything else you’re supposed to know how to do when you play piano. And Rey really has been trying, but everything that isn’t directly Ben-related goes in one ear and out the other. She can’t remember sharps from flats, but she’s completely mesmerized by the way Ben’s hands—massive now, thanks to a positively intimidating growth spurt over the summer—move gently across the keys, coaxing a story out of every sonata. Her chronic inattentiveness is a symptom of a larger disease that has transformed Rey into a sweaty, stammering, anxious mess, suddenly unable to be in the presence of her best friend without getting lost in the depths of his dark brown eyes or lulled to incoherence by the brand new bass tone of his voice, which causes every offhand comment come out in a growl that makes her toes literally curl. 

_Crush_ doesn’t even begin to describe what she’s going through; it’s more like Rey’s gone completely insane. She’s cried herself to sleep more times than she can count, has lost whole hours to counting the freckles scattered across his nose. She can’t eat without thinking of his lips, can’t do her homework without his voice in her head correcting her mistakes, can barely take notes in class without her eyes wandering to the back of his head and his glorious dark hair. 

Also, last week Ben put his arm around her and covered each of her hands with his own when he demonstrated a technique, and she hasn’t stopped thinking about it since.

And to top it all off, they’re in the _band practice room;_ every band kid knows what the practice rooms are really for, and information on the exact geometry of the visual field of the window has spread down in whispers from student to student, probably dating back to the exact moment those doors were installed. Rey has utterly failed to pass her Music Theory Level 1 exams, but she knows exactly when Mr. Pryde is stalking past the window based on the variations in the light bouncing off the greasy beige paint on the wall. 

On this particular afternoon Rey has managed to convince Ben that she would benefit best from an up close demonstration, so he’s playing the second movement of Chopin’s Piano Concerto No. 1. Even without the backing orchestra, the concerto is stunning to experience, grand and romantic and emotional, filling the tiny space around them until it feels like nothing else exists. Ben’s brow is furrowed slightly in concentration, as if he’s some kind of Byronic hero deep in existential thought, and every so often he leans close against her side as he reaches for the high notes. He looks down at her during a pause and a little smile flits across the corner of his lips; Rey's heart is sitting in her throat, and she's acutely aware of the flyaway hairs at the base of her neck, sticky with sweat. She resists the urge to sneak a whiff of her underarm; three layers of antiperspirant have proven to be more than enough. Ben doesn't seem to notice the tiny ways she's breaking down, and it's both a blessing and a curse. 

"Do you have a date for Poe's Bar Mitzvah?" she blurts, and Ben's fingers slip on the piano, bringing the concerto to a discordant end.

“Um.” He cracks his knuckles, eyes still trained on the sheet music. “I don’t know if I’m going.” 

“...Oh,” Rey stares down at her hands in her lap. “Okay. Well. Never mind, then. Forget I asked.” 

There’s a moment of truly excruciating silence, during which Rey lives and dies a thousand lifetimes, and then Ben starts playing again—not the Chopin, but something prim and upbeat. 

Tears are building hot at the back of her eyes, and she exhales through pursed lips. _Okay,_ she tells herself. _Switch to assuming he's rejected you. That's the information we have._ Maz is always trying to get her to do that—to act on the information she has, instead of letting herself be consumed by the conflagration of _what if_. 

Rey has the following pieces of information: Ben Solo is her best friend, and has been for the past four years. He and his parents have made her feel like part of the family without question or restraint, and they have played an undeniable role in her rising levels of confidence and success. Ben is sweet and noble and smart and always challenging her, and Rey knows how to make him laugh and is the only one who can beat him at Mario Kart and was there when his dog died. 

Oh, and she’s in love with him; that is information she knows with the sinking certainty of a sailor watching the prow of a ship disappear below the surface of a stormy sea. And while Rey was able to deny it at first, she’s been laying the groundwork for the past few weeks to test the hypothesis that maybe Ben might like her back; so far, the results haven’t been encouraging. Time for a Hail Mary. 

Rey coughs as casually as she can. “I mean—Hux asked me. To go with him, to the Bar Mitzvah.”

This time, Ben doesn’t stop playing. “Is that so?” he replies impassively. 

“And I thought if you had a date, we could all hang together,” Rey finishes, swallowing painfully as anxiety grips her around the throat. “But—never mind. I’ll probably skip it anyway too.” 

She swears she sees Ben’s jaw twitch out of the corner of her eye, and he hits the bass F key particularly hard. 

“No, I think you should go,” he growls. “With...Hux.” Then he keeps playing, basic scales this time, his mouth set in a thin line as if to say _this conversation is over_. 

_So. This is me,_ Rey thinks, as the sheet music swims in front of her eyes. _This is me, who will never be with Ben Solo. This is what that life looks like._

It's basically the same life as the one she had mere moments ago; it’s just one tiny little change, but that change makes everything else seem bitter and pointless.

A sniff escapes her before she can stop it, and she tips her head back, willing her tears to drain back into the well of sadness from which they escaped. Despite all the dignity she’s already sacrificed on the altar of puberty, Rey would still sooner die than do something ridiculous like burst out crying in front of Ben Solo because he doesn't want to kiss her.

As if on cue, Ben abruptly stops playing. "What did I do wrong?" he demands, his voice cracking childishly as he turns toward her. 

Rey is so stunned she temporarily stops crying. “What?” 

Ben scowls, folding his arms across his chest. "You've been acting like a complete headcase since the summer ended, and I don't know what I've done wrong. I thought maybe something happened with your grandfather, but you would tell me if something did, so that can’t be it. I know you’re not flunking your classes, because we have the same schedule this year and you always copy off my chemistry homework. I’ve tried to invite you over more, I’ve tried to hang out with you in a group, I just—tell me what I did, Rey. Please. I can’t do this anymore.” 

A hiccuping sob escapes her, and she breathes in a few open-mouthed slow gasps so she doesn’t totally fall apart. “Nothing," she manages in a thick rasp, looking back down and sniffling wetly as all the blood rushes back to make her cheeks burn. She's recently noticed how long Ben's eyelashes are, and they make his gaze even more intense, like a laser scope aimed right at the very softest parts of her soul.

Ben fists his hands into his hair. “Then what—do you not want to be friends anymore? Is that it? Because you’ve got Poe and Finn and Rose and _Hux_ now? Am I really going to lose you to the absolute worst kid in our class? _Really?_ ”

"...Lose me?" 

Ben freezes. “Sorry?” 

Rey blinks. “That’s what you said. Well, technically ‘lose _you,_ ’ I guess.” 

“What? No.” 

She nods. “Yes, you did, just now. You said—you’re worried you’re going to _lose_ me—” she’s cut off as their gazes meet, and suddenly her throat has completely closed up. Something flickers to life in Ben’s eyes and his expression darkens, his lips parted ever so slightly; the air feels thick, as if it’s made of taffy, and Rey’s heart is pounding so hard she’s sure he must be able to hear it. 

Several things happen at once. Ben ducks his head, a movement so sudden that Rey instinctively flinches sideways; then the light from the window shifts and she sees Mr. Pryde walk by the doorway out of the corner of her eye—and then stars are bursting across her vision as they knock foreheads with an audible _thunk_ and his nose violently crashes into hers. 

Rey hears Ben gasp through faintly ringing ears: "Rey! Oh, god, Rey, I'm so sorry, I—"

Mr. Pryde storms in, ready to catch two fornicating teenagers, and it's only when his expression transforms from fury to horror that Rey realizes that there's something on her face.

 _Of course I'm covered in snot,_ she grumbles to herself, pulling the sleeve of her cardigan over her hand to wipe at her nose; it’s a bad habit from very long ago, but neither Ben nor Mr. Pryde are the type to smack her hand with a ruler—

"Oh," Rey hears herself breathe as she sees the smear of bright red blood.

"What did you do to her?!" Mr. Pryde snaps.

“It was an accident, we—we bumped into each other—” Ben stammers. Then his arm is around her shoulders and he's pulling her to her feet; Rey lets him hustle her out of the music wing and to the nurse’s office, as she pinches her nostrils closed with the increasingly stained sleeve of her cardigan. 

The nurse is a shrewd woman with a too-tight blonde ponytail, and she doesn't have a gentle touch; but Rey knows how to remain still, and she keeps herself busy during the exam by watching Ben out of the corner of her eye. She must have a concussion or something, because it seems like he's trembling, his gaze trained on a dubious stain on the linoleum.

"Doesn't look like you have a concussion!" the nurse announces, right on cue. "Nose isn't broken either, you should be completely fine."

"But—" Ben blurts, too loudly, "all the blood—"

The nurse shrugs. “Sometimes you just get hit in the right place! It seems like a lot, but it will stop eventually—” her beeper chirps at her waist, and she frowns at it. “Anyway, you’re welcome to stay here until things clot, I have an online bid that’s closing—” 

She’s gone before either of them can protest, her eyes trained on her beeper as she shuts the exam room door behind her with a definitive _click_. 

They’re alone, again. And this time there’s no window on the door. 

Rey slides off the exam table and they sit in silence, side by side on the threadbare chairs. Ben moves the kleenex box from the table so she can reach it, and Rey dabs at her nose, every time coming away with almost comical amounts of blood. The wastebasket beside her starts to fill with reddened tissues, as whole minutes tick by and neither of them says a word.

Finally the blood slows to a trickle, and Rey gets up to rinse her face at the sink, scrubbing at her skin with one hand as she watches the water get lighter and lighter until finally it runs clear. She turns off the tap and straightens, catching her reflection in the tiny rectangular mirror hung above the sink; the entire area around her mouth and chin is reddened, a combination of blood and scrubbing, and her eyes are puffy from holding back tears all afternoon. As Rey watches, a bubble of dark red blood dangles from one nostril, and she dives back to the box of tissues, stuffing one up her nose to staunch the blood with milliseconds to spare. She makes another kleenex spear to plug up her other nostril, just for good measure; the leftover tissues hang down past the corners of her mouth, like demented walrus tusks. 

The clock ticks. Her heart beats. She hears Ben’s hands tighten their grip on the edge of his chair. 

"Why did you do that?" she finally snaps, whirling to face him. "Was that some sort of joke? Were you trying to prove a point? Why won’t you just—" she's cut off by the abrupt press of his lips against hers.

 _Oh,_ Rey thinks. _Well._

When Ben pulls away a second later, Rey glances up, and a million places inside of her tie themselves in delicious knots when she sees the look on his face.

"You have the most beautiful eyelashes I've ever seen," she murmurs.

"One of your tissues fell out," he replies.

“Oh, shit—” Rey scrambles to reload, but he catches her wrist before she can grab a kleenex, pulling her back into another kiss. This time he’s more assertive, cupping her face in his hands as their mouths open, and a keening sound escapes Rey’s throat when he runs his tongue along the line of her teeth—

“—Hey! What are you two doing in here?” The nurse barks, throwing the door wide open. They both jump to their feet. 

“Nothing!” they yell in unconvincing unison. 

“Well then what the hell are you doing in here? Get back to class!” the nurse snaps, giving absolutely no indication that she treated Rey just fifteen minutes before. 

With the spell of the moment rudely broken, Rey wastes no time in darting through the doorway and speed-walking out of the infirmary, her heart pounding in her veins. She hopes Ben is following her, but she can’t bear to look back and confirm it because all she can think about is what it’s like to kiss him; that’s a new piece of information Rey has now, and she can never unlearn it. 

Her adrenaline carries her all the way back to the arts wing before she dares to look back, and sure enough she feels her knees wobble when she sees Ben’s face. She covers by leaning back against the bank of lockers, folding her arms over her chest. 

Ben comes to a stop in front of her, glancing down—he’s a head taller than her now, it’s both bizarre and utterly breathtaking—as a blush creeps across the top of his cheekbones.

 _What now?_ she wants to ask, terror catching the words at her throat. _What now?_

Rey knows the answer she wants to hear. She can’t bear to know if it’s the answer Ben is willing to give. 

“Um,” he eventually breathes, fidgeting his hands by his sides, “so…we should probably go back to class.” 

“Yeah,” she concedes, furrowing her brow. “Though hang on a second, you’ve got a little blood...” she licks her thumb and reaches up, rubbing at a slight crust of red flecked at one of his dimple lines, and Ben actually _leans_ into her touch, eyes fluttering shut. Rey exhales, steeling every bit of her resolve that she can muster; and in the absence of his searing gaze she summons the courage to stand on tiptoe to softly press her mouth against his. At first Ben freezes, his whole body going rigid in a way that seems very much like a fight-flight-freeze response, and just as Rey starts to hope the earth will swallow her whole, Ben makes a little sighing sound and wraps his arms tightly around her. This time he’s unhurried, assertive, reverent—and it’s in the heat of his mouth and the roll of his tongue that Rey understands, finally, how badly he’s wanted this too. As she reaches up to wrap her arms around his neck and his teeth catch her bottom lip, Rey learns one final new piece of information: she’s going to spend the rest of her life longing to be here, held tight and safe, feeling Ben Solo’s heartbeat reverberate against her own. _Home,_ she thinks. _That’s what this is._

Ben pulls away, pressing his forehead against hers. “Come with me to Poe’s Bar Mitzvah,” he whispers. “I’m a much better date.” 

“Oh my god, yes,” Rey grins, swooping in for another quick kiss. “I thought you’d never ask.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments always appreciated! Come to [Twitter](https://www.twitter.com/littlestarlost) for updates, text fics, and gushing about our favourite pair of star-crossed disasters! <3

**Author's Note:**

> Comments are extremely appreciated! <3 I'm brand new to this fabulous fandom so please let me know if I'm doing alright!
> 
> I am on [Twitter](https://www.twitter.com/littlestarlost/) quite a lot these days talking about how much I love these two blockheads, so please come say hi!


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